Training foster parents in loyalty conflict: A training evaluation

Fifty two foster parents participated in one of seven offerings of a two-and-a-half hour training on the issue of children caught in a loyalty conflict. Prior to the training foster parents completed a measure of their demographics, receptivity to learning about the issue, and their knowledge about the issue. Following the training the participants completed a measure of their perception that the training was helpful, their intent to change based on the training, and their knowledge about loyalty conflicts. They also participated in a focused discussion about loyalty conflicts. In this sample foster parents were found to have high levels of receptivity to training, high rates of perceived helpfulness of the training, and high levels of intent to change after the training as well as an increase in knowledge regarding loyalty conflict from before to after the training. Despite limitations in sampling strategy and sample size, the data support the belief that foster parents want to learn about this issue and can benefit from a single training on it.     

Home-based, family-centered intervention: evaluation of a foster care prevention program

A family service agency contributes to the growing literature on a new service area through an analysis of closed cases in its own home-based service program, and compares its findings with other published reports.     

Placement stability for adolescents in foster care: findings from a program experiment

Increased stability in foster care placements for adolescents who had multiple placement failures and who were alienated from family and other social institutions is reported as the outcome of a demonstration placement-planning and support service in a public agency. Other positive findings are described.     

Increasing college access for youth aging out of foster care: Evaluation of a summer camp program for foster youth transitioning from high school to college

Young people who transition from the foster care system face many challenges including lack of support and other educational barriers. They are less likely to graduate from high school than their counterparts and go on to college yet despite challenges, many succeed and take advantage of higher education programs.In Michigan, a state with one of the highest percentage of youth in foster care, Michigan State University developed a small scale, targeted intervention to help transitioning foster youth achieve their goals of pursuing higher education. Led by the School of Social Work in collaboration with other colleges and disciplines, it was demonstrated that a campus based learning program for transitioning foster youth can help contribute toward a perceived increase in knowledge and information about college life, funding and admissions procedures. The educational process involved peer support, role modeling, mentoring and active learning sessions led by the faculty and students who were often foster care alumni themselves. Leaders and speakers came from a range of disciplines, institutions and organizations. This approach and curriculum contributed to perceptions of the camp as enhancing life skills, self-concept, empowerment and sense of purpose. Consequently, this program contributed to the resilience of those who attended and potentially helped build steps from care to higher education.     

Social work and law in a foster care/adoption program

The push toward permanency planning has led to a blurring of distinctions between foster care and adoption, and consequent emotional and legal entanglements. The program described here was designed to emphasize cooperation between social workers and lawyers to safeguard the rights of all parties, and the authors discuss the pitfalls of casework with both biological and foster parents.     

Designing a campus support program for foster care alumni: Preliminary evidence for a strengths framework

Campus support programs for foster care alumni (FCA) have emerged in an attempt to improve higher education outcomes for former foster youth. However, these programs have little empirical or theoretical literature to guide their development. We present a case study of a newly developed campus support program for FCA which utilizes a strengths perspective. We analyze quantitative and qualitative data collected before and during the first two years of program operation to explore whether a strengths perspective can be successfully applied to the unique needs of FCA in higher education. Results reveal that the strengths perspective has potential and identifies three areas in which this approach appears to effectively intersect with challenges faced by FCA, a) promoting positive identities as survivors, b) respecting autonomy, and c) mobilizing assets of resilience, perseverance, and community. We discuss the benefits and challenges of helping students address these issues. Our findings also reveal that the strengths perspective is not redundant with traditional higher education retention models, and in the three areas identified, is diametrically opposed to the students' previous experiences with the foster care system.     

The abused and neglected foster child: Determinants of emotional conflict and oppositional behavior

Behavioral and emotional problems have been observed in emotionally vulnerable children in foster care under certain circumstances. A common pattern involves the unpredictable appearance of a previously absent or unavailable natural parent. Such an occurrence precipitates the reawakening of the child's ambivalent feelings toward both natural and foster parents as well as their fears of abandonment. This frequently leads to behavior that is oppositional and difficult to manage. If the foster parents find the child's behavior unmanageable, and if they are not provided with appropriate professional support during this difficult period, a crisis often follows that precipitates the child's removal from the foster home. Individual, familial, and systemic contributions to this dilemma are discussed. This article emphasizes the origins and nature of the intrapsychic dilemma faced by these children. Particular emphasis is placed on the manifestations of a conflict of loyalty, in the child, and its relationship to the oppositional behavior of these children in foster care. Additional considerations include the impact of inconsistent parenting, abuse and neglect by the natural parents, the assumption of a parental role by the child and a concomitant renunciation of the child's dependency needs, as well as an examination of the role of the foster parent's fantasy of what it will be like to parent a traumatized child.     

Evaluation of a multi-site program designed to strengthen relational bonds for siblings separated by foster care

Sibling relationships in foster care settings have received increased attention in recent years. Despite growing evidence regarding the protective potential of sibling relationships for youth in care, some sibling groups continue to experience foster care related separation, and few programs exist to address the needs of these youth.This study describes and evaluates Camp To Belong, a multi-site program designed to provide short-term reunification to separated sibling groups through a week-long summer camp experience. Using a pre-test post-test survey design, this paper examines changes in youth ratings of sibling conflict and sibling support across camps located in six geographically distinct regions of the United States. The effects of youth age, number of prior camp exposures, and camp location were tested using multilevel modeling procedures.Findings suggest that participation in Camp To Belong may reduce sibling conflict, and improvements in sibling support are noted for youth who have had prior exposure to the camp’s programming. Camp-level variance in the sibling support outcome highlight the complex nature of relationships for siblings separated by foster care, and suggest the need for additional research. Lessons learned from this multi-site evaluation and future directions are discussed.     

Moral conflict and dynamic equilibrium: Public relations as strategic conflict management

In the literature review and proposed theoretical models, the author argues that we often engage in advocacy in public relations on behalf of causes we hold dear, much like a strong defender on a soccer field becomes physical in defending the goal without violating explicit rules or our sense of what is right and appropriate in a competitive world. The author presents this image of an athlete contending in fair competition as a metaphor for a rejection of canonized thinking about accommodation in public relations in favor of public relations as strategic conflict management. This research is offered to continue the discussion in the field of public relations from the contingency theory of strategic conflict management and consider the ethical challenges faced by public relations practitioners in an ongoing cycle of conflict. This article is included in the special issue on the contingency theory of strategic conflict management.     

Foundations of the open society: discourse ethics and the logic of inquiry

A jury is called upon to debate the guilt or innocence of a woman accused of murder. The jury can deliberate or ask for more information about the case. They want to achieve a maximally truth-like verdict: they want to be as close as possible in their estimation of the woman’s degree of responsibility for the murder to her actual degree of responsibility at the time of the murder. What principles should guide their verbal interaction? What rules of discourse and dialogue should they follow if they want to achieve maximal truth likeness in their verdict? How do current deliberation procedures and practices depart from the ideal of an open or authentic debate? This paper contributes to both the normative and the positive dimensions of the debate concerning the discursive forms of the open society, in two ways. First, it addresses the link between the rules for ethical discourse proposed by Karl Otto Apel and Robert Alexy some twenty years ago and the logic of inquiry proposed by Karl Popper as a normative approach to scientific process some fifty years ago. It is found that if a group’s members abide by the rules of ethical discourse, then the process of discovery that their process as a whole instantiates will abide by the Popperian logic of scientific inquiry. Second, it provides an analysis of the ways in which forms of social organization that we are familiar with (markets, representative democracies) depart from the discursive ideals of the open society. I will end the paper by arguing that going from current ‘crippled’ forms of discourse that bound correspondingly ‘closed’ societies cannot be accomplished merely by asserting and guaranteeing the exercise of a right to ‘freedom of expression; a more comprehensive ‘discourse ethics’ is needed in order to bring about the development of the open society.     

Effectiveness of a group-based academic tutoring program for children in foster care: A randomized controlled trial

The consistently poor educational achievement of children in foster care has been associated with many negative outcomes including long term poor adult adjustment (e.g., higher rates of suicide, criminality, and substance abuse). The current study was undertaken to improve foster children's academic skills through academic remediation. Across this two year randomized study, 91 children in out of home foster or kinship care, between grades 1 and 8 inclusive, completed the study. One-half were randomly assigned to the 30-week direct-instruction small group tutoring condition, while the other half served as wait-list controls. A statistically significant increase in standard scores was found on reading decoding, spelling and mathematic skills for the children who received tutoring, but no differences were obtained on sentence comprehension. Significant effect sizes, in the small to moderate range, were also found in support of the tutoring condition across these three domains. The implications of these positive findings as they relate to improving educational achievement among children in foster care are discussed.     

Class conflict and racist ideology in the formation of modern Guyanese society

Pendant toute l'histoire coloniale de la Guyane, la classe dirigeante a imposé de façon disproportionnée une politique de répartition de bénéfices et de charges économiques aux divers groupes ethniques subordonnés. Cette politique se justifiait en termes des stéréotypes raciales des indoguyanais et des afro-guyanais de la part de la classe dirigeante, ce qui avait comme résultat une disparité sociale et économique entre les deux groupes. Bien qu'une coöpération ait existé périodiquement entre les travailleurs indo-guyanais et afro-guyanais dans la lutte contre la classe dirigeante, ils se sont souvent servis des mêmes stéréotypes raciales que la classe dirigeante dans une tentative d'affermir leurs situations sociales et économiques les uns vis-à-vis des autres. Les études pluralistes et culturelles-écologiques de la société guyanaise tiennent rarement compte de ces procédés.
Throughout Guyanese colonial history, the ruling class applied a policy of disproportionate allocation of economic benefits and burdens to different subordinated ethnic groups. This policy was justified in terms of ruling-class racial sterotypes of Indo- and Afro-Guyanese, and resulted in social and economic disparities between these groups. Although there was periodic cooperation between Indo- and Afro-Guyanese workers in struggles against the ruling class, they often used ruling-class racial stereotypes in attempts to strengthen their social and economic positions vis-à-vis each other. Pluralist and cultural-ecological approaches to Guyanese society seldom take these processes into account.     

Underserved parents,underserved youth: Considering foster parent willingness to foster substance-using adolescents

Adolescents involved with foster care are five times more likely to receive a drug dependence diagnosis when compared to adolescents in the general population. Prior research has shown that substance use is often hidden from providers, negating any chance for treatment and almost guaranteeing poor post-foster care outcomes. There are virtually no studies that examine the willingness (and its determinants) to foster youth with substance abuse problems. The current study conducted a nationally-distributed survey of 752 currently licensed foster care parents that assessed willingness to foster youth overall and by type of drug used, and possible correlates of this decision (e.g., home factors, system factors, and individual foster parent factors such as ratings of perceived difficulty in fostering this population). Overall, willingness to foster a youth involved with alcohol and other drugs (AOD) was contingent upon the types of drugs used. The odds that a parent would foster an AOD-involved youth were significantly increased by being licensed as a treatment foster home, having fostered an AOD-involved youth in the past, having AOD-specific training and past agency-support when needed, and self-efficacy with respect to positive impact. Surprisingly, when religion played a large part in the decision to foster any child, the odds of willingness to foster an AOD-involved youth dropped significantly. These results suggest that a large proportion of AOD-involved youth who find themselves in the foster care system will not have foster families willing to parent them, thereby forcing placement into a variety of congregate care facilities (e.g., residential treatment facilities, group homes). Specific ways in which the system can address these issues to improve placement and permanency efforts are provided.     

Family to family: reconstructing foster care in the US

The public child welfare system in North America is faced with growing deprivation, rising numbers of children who need out-of-home placements for increasingly lengthy periods, and a shortage of foster carers. The Family to Family initiative offers public agencies funds and tools to help them strengthen family support services within the communities from which children enter the system, improve the quantity and quality of neighbourhood-based foster carers and develop the capacity to collect and analyse outcome data.